


The Un-Orphaned

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon, Crossover, Het, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-10-04
Updated: 2004-10-04
Packaged: 2018-12-26 23:54:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12069555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: Crossover with Harry Potter. Sometimes it takes not belonging anywhere to find your true place.





	The Un-Orphaned

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling. I am not she. I own nothing. Do not sue. 

Author’s Note/Warning: Deals with child-abuse and of individuals under the age of consent engaging in both consensual and non-consensual sexual acts, though nothing graphic in either situation. Also, as you’ve probably guessed, given the crossovers of choice, there will be same sex relationships (both m/m and f/f) as well as the rare hetero-love.

Chapter note: This chapter from Harry's pov, Next chapter from Brian’s. I swear to you this is a B/J fic. Just takes a little back story. 

Thanks to my new lovely beta Kristin.

* * *

Through the rainstorm   
Came  
Sanctuary   
And I felt my spirit  
Fly 

~~~ Seal 

***+++***  
 _(England, late 1984)_

They were arguing again. With each other. Uncle Vernon with his loud bellows, Aunt Petunia hissing in that frightening, quiet tone. He hated it when they argued. In the dark, in his cupboard, the sounds floated in to him beneath the thin slit of space that divided door from floor, him from them, and it sounded like roars, like monsters facing off behind the door about to pounce and break it open any second. 

“You don’t know these people like I do, Vernon,” hiss, spit, “they’ll do whatever it takes to get their way. They’re _dangerous_.” 

He couldn’t always make out the words. And usually when he did, he didn’t want to. 

“I don’t care! I don’t want that thing in my house another SECOND.” Bellow. 

Harry shivered in the darkness and wrapped his thin arms around his knobby knees, hugging them even tighter to his chest. It was bare comfort. But really, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d had any more than bare comfort; he’d always imagined better though. Someone else’s arms holding him tight and making the nasty sounds of his aunt and uncle screaming at one another just … stop. 

He shivered again, his chest hitching for a moment before settling back into its rhythmic quiver. It was stuffy and hot and tasted of old mothballs and smelt of warm musty dust in his cupboard, yet, goosebumps rose all over his body anyway. 

“We have no choice! What are we supposed to do?" 

“Think of DUDLEY, do you really want that –that—foulness tainting our lovely little boy? And after what he did today? The poor lad’s going to be having nightmares for years! I refuse to allow him to spend another day here, Petunia! Not one more single day.” 

Even with his hands pressed hard over his ears he could hear it, the screaming, it didn’t even mute it any, so instead he clutched knees to chest and huddled pitifully on his thin mattress. He hated when they argued. It was always about him. Ever since he could remember that was the only thing they disagreed on. Loudly. In hissing-spitting-biting-dangerous-bellowing-frightening-earth-will-move-my-will-be-done tones that rocked him with sharp stabs of prickling fear churning in his belly. 

He tried not to listen to the words, but he couldn’t stop that either. 

Neither his Aunt nor his Uncle wanted him there, living with them in their house. But his parents were dead, in a car accident that was his fault apparently. He was a loud annoying baby that constantly wanted attention. One day he was too loud and too annoying and made his ‘fool’ dad get distracted and next thing you know they were bouncing off of a street post) And he had nowhere else to go. No one who would take him. He should be grateful they’d taken him in at all. No one else had wanted him. 

Only he wasn’t glad. 

He wished they really would send him away like they threatened. So at least he wouldn’t hear “Freak” and “Bad influence” and “Thing” and all those other nasty words they called him. All the time. Not just when they were arguing. And he wouldn’t hear the hissing-spitting-bellowing- well, all of that anymore either, no one moaning and complaining that they hadn’t needed an extra mouth to feed, another body to clothe. 

There were days he wanted nothing more than for them to send him away. 

He could take care of himself. He already did, mostly. He cooked the meals for them all, cleaned up after everyone after, washed himself, dressed himself, brushed his own hair, entertained himself with shadow puppets and Dudley’s old throw-aways, cared for himself when he fell ill…

He’d leave if he could; if they wouldn’t send him away, he’d do it. He’d dreamt about it loads of times. He wouldn’t even take anything with him so they couldn’t say he was stealing. No. They could say it, but for once no one would believe them. He’d just leave. And he’d find a new family; he’d find his family. His mum and dad weren’t really dead, after all, they were alive and well and they lived on a farm with horses and cows and ducks, and they were just waiting for him to break away from the evil hold of his Aunt and Uncle and …

And they’d love him. And they wouldn’t think he was a freak. And they wouldn’t argue about how to get rid of him, or say how much they wished he’d never survived the accident, how unfair it was considering he was the cause of it in the first place. 

They’d love him like his Aunt and Uncle loved Dudley. 

He thought of it all the time. Sometimes he could make himself believe it was true.

But…

The very first thing his aunt and uncle taught him was the difference between make-believe (‘things that can’t ever ever happen, and aren’t allowed in this house’) and reality. 

So it was only logical that since he was four years old now, those times were getting fewer and further between. 

***+++***

Harry fell asleep to the sound of their voices, and woke again to silence, the kind that was thick and unnerving, heavy with a sort of unpleasantness that meant something terrible was going to happen. 

He sat up and rubbed his eyes with the back of both hands, instantly wide-awake. 

The temperature had dropped while he’d been sleeping, but the goosebumps that remained on his arms had little to do with being cold, and no amount of rubbing would make them go away. 

With a creak and little warning beyond that, his cupboard door swung open. Hovering over him in the darkness was his Uncle Vernon, staring in on him. “Get up, boy,” he grunted hoarsely. 

Harry blinked up at him owlishly. This had never happened before. “Why,” he asked, not moving. “What’s going on?” 

Uncle Vernon grunted and shoved the cupboard door further back, shifting aside to gesture firmly that Harry should come out. Immediately. 

Climbing to his feet, Harry complied. 

“What happened, Uncle Vernon? What’s wrong?” Sometimes if he protested long enough, or asked in just the right, persistent tone, he could make his uncle be agreeable. More often than not he’d end up locked away in his cupboard instead, but sometimes… 

This wasn’t one of those times. 

The bigger man turned a no-nonsense glare on Harry, waving off his questions impatiently. 

He lumbered off without another look; Harry had to scramble to keep up. 

At the front door, Uncle Vernon unlatched all the bolts in perfect silence, swinging the door open and gesturing Harry out when he was done. 

It was cold and silent, pitch dark except for the streetlights lining up along the road and the odd star, bright enough to cut through heavy clouds. 

Harry shivered a little in the night air; he hadn’t had time enough to take his jacket. He never remembered to besides. It was only when Aunt Petunia reminded Dudley to take his that Harry remembered. 

“Uncle Vernon…”

“We’re going somewhere special tonight,” Uncle Vernon cut in, ignoring Harry’s voice as if he’d never spoke. “And I don’t want to hear a peep out of you until we arrive, understand?” 

Harry nodded but his Uncle didn’t glance down. Did that mean he should say ‘yes’? No. Better not chance it. 

They moved on again, his uncle closing the door softly behind them, before Harry could think too hard on it. 

Outside, it was dark and quiet, nothing stirred except the crickets. No alley cats, no hooting night birds. 

Uncle Vernon ambled his way over to the family car, his prized possession, and climbed in behind the wheel. Harry followed, scrambling his way into the backseat and buckling himself with a click. 

***+++***

They drive for a long long time. So long that Harry fell asleep and woken up twice. The last time there aren’t even lights anymore, just darkness and silence, and the thrumming of the moving car. Long stretches of empty road and equally empty flat lands passed. So long and so empty that he and Uncle Vernon could have very easily been the last people left on Earth. 

He wasn’t aware of drifting off a third time, but then he was blinking awake to find Uncle Vernon was turning turned onto a narrow road, rolling slowly down until they came to a stop in the driveway of an old house. It was the kind of place witches and monsters would live. There were probably ghosts and goblins and all kinds of rotten creatures in there. 

Harry bit his lower lip, no longer sleepy, the thumb of his right hand unconsciously drawing circular patterns against his cheek closer and closer to his mouth. 

They were all waiting for the opportunity to eat a disobedient little boy. One who never listened, always did things wrong, who was too loud, who said the ‘m’ word. 

The car shut off with a sound rather like a sigh. Then the driver’s door creaked open. 

What was Uncle Vernon doing? Why was he getting out? No. 

No No No NO. 

The sound of the car door slamming shut, with Uncle Vernon on the other side of it, sliced through the stillness of the night sharply, obtrusively. Harry cringed in the backseat, feeling smaller and smaller, and trapped. More naked than when Dudley yanked his trousers down in front of all the neighborhood, and then laughed and laughed at him. Helpless and panicked, worse even than when Aunt Petunia walked ahead of him so quickly in the grocery store that sometimes he couldn’t see her familiar thin frame in the swollen emptiness of aisle after aisle. 

He felt even worse when Uncle Vernon opened Harry’s door and motioned for him to get out. A fluttery hurt spread through his stomach and twisted. 

Uncle Vernon didn’t wait for Harry to unbuckle himself, instead the man yanked it off of him and bodily pulled him through the door, shutting it firmly behind them. 

When Harry’s world stopped swimming and he was righted again, he was the only one standing beside the car. Uncle Vernon was marching towards the house. 

Towards the house. 

Fear of being left alone unstuck his legs and forced him away from the former safety of the car. 

“I don’t like this place, I’m scared.” His heart was beating fast and hard inside his chest, and he didn’t mean to admit as much, since his uncle didn’t stand for whining, but his hands were trembling and everything was just so quiet. Harry reached for his uncle desperately, grasped for his uncle’s hand. Surprisingly he wasn’t shaken off. 

His uncle’s larger hand was sweaty and squishy, and it swallowed Harry’s own whole. His heart quieted slowly with the contact. If only he were brave enough to bury his head in the loose folds of his uncle’s coat, he’d be safer then. But what if…what if it so disgusted him that he let go altogether? Shoved Harry away, and then what? 

He’d be left all alone in this creepy place. 

Harry couldn’t suppress the whimper that clawed its way up from his belly when they neared the porch. 

“Shh, close your eyes, Harry.” Uncle Vernon gave Harry a little nudge up the first step. 

“But I can’t walk like--”

“Do as I say.” Nudge. Second step. Closer to the front door. Harry shut his eyes tight. “Don’t open them,” Uncle Vernon warned, “just keep them closed.” 

Nudge. Third step. 

Yank. Pull. Harry floundered, all limbs working, stumbling hard to the wooden planks of the porch floor. His death grip on his uncle’s hand didn’t yield. 

Then that hand was being forcibly taken away. 

Harry scrambled at the hand that was being extracted from his grip. Frantically, with his whole being, he fought to keep it close and his eyes shut. 

“It’s all right,” Uncle Vernon said gruffly. With his other hand he awkwardly patted at Harry’s head in what seemed to be meant as a comforting gesture. It caused that funny fluttering feeling to flap harder, Uncle Vernon never comforted Harry. Never. 

“No, don’t leave! Don’t leave!” Harry kept his eyes shut tight, tight. 

“Shhh. I’ll return, I have something to take care of first. Quit this nonsense immediately.” 

“Don’t go,” Harry whimpered once more. 

“Just wait here, keep your eyes closed. I’ll be back.” Uncle Vernon took the hand away completely, leaving Harry futilely clutching empty air. 

Harry curled himself around his knees and pressed his hands over his ears. There was nothing behind him. No witches, no ghosts, no monsters. They weren’t real. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon said ‘They. Weren’t. Real.’ There was nothing to be scared of. He’d just wait until his uncle came back, whatever he was doing couldn’t take that long. 

He wasn’t some little baby. He wasn’t going to cry.

He wasn’t. He wasn’t. He wasn’t. Anytime now, his uncle would be back.

The sound of the car starting spooked him and he very nearly let his eyes fly open of their own accord, but fought that too and held on tighter to his knees. 

His uncle would be back any minute, and they could leave this dreadful place. He was not going to cry. 

Somehow or other, when he wasn’t paying attention, his thumb gravitated towards his mouth.

The morning found him like that, curled around himself on an empty front stoop, sucking his thumb, eyes still tightly shut, utterly alone. 

***+++***  
 _(almost 1 year later, 1985: Liberty Avenue)_

Harry had been in some pretty interesting places before – waiting outside barrooms and hidden behind trashy restaurants, curled up in the backs of trucks on deserted highways, miserable in grimy motel rooms – but he’d never seen a place like this. It was loud, and it was bright, and it moved. People everywhere, most in jeans and t-shirts like him, but others dressed in things no sane human being would be caught dead in. Women and men and others ‘with sex as yet undetermined’ – as Gene liked to say-- in black leather get-ups that flashed underneath streetlights, half-shirts that exposed taunt stomachs and feathery boas wrapped around necks. 

Someone walked by, without sparing Harry a second glance, either a very ugly woman, or a man with a fetish for looking like a three-dollar hooker. Definite drag queen. 

Gene would have said, “pay attention, Harry, that’s a tran--” Hmm… transvescual…tranvesses…trancension…transcendent…transsual…transism… “That’s a trans-something with no class. If you’re going to wear a dress, Gabbana or nothing.” 

Harry trudged down the street, shoulders hunched against the night air. If he kept his hands twisted in his shirt, they’d warm up, but then his sides would be cold, so it was best to let his hands freeze. Sacrifice, Gene said, that’s a word you have to learn in a hurry if you’re gonna stay by yourself. 

Harry was hungry and cold and tired of staying by himself. He needed Gene. 

Across the street from where he stood was a restaurant place. Maybe he’d have better luck in there. Someone had to know where his Gene was. 

Harry got closer to the restaurant, remaining cautious, but barely anyone stared at him, just as usual. 

Figures of two men hung in the window, made out of wire or metal or something, something dark and sharp looking. They didn’t have trousers on and their pants flashed red and they – Harry’s eyes widened – they were doing the ‘bad thing’ or at least kind of the bad thing, they were touching each other’s private business. Their hands were down each other’s pants…

Despite fast forming doubts, Harry entered. 

Inside, it even busier than outside, only tighter, closer. Harry had to slip around and shove through hips butting him out of the way, fast moving arms swinging, knees and hard shoes scuttling past. He was out of breath by the time he slid into a booth, and by then he’d already noticed that the patrons consisted almost entirely of men, the waiters were men, there was a bloke behind the counter…

Gene must be in here, he couldn’t stand women. And there wasn’t a single woman to be seen except for a waitress-lady with loads of blonde hair that was coming towards him and positively shrieking.

“Aren’t you just the little angel!”

Harry looked around cautiously, wondering who she was squealing at… until he realized it was him. Oh bugger, one of those.

She was big all over, big knockers, big hair in a weird mutant bun, big smile, big voice. She was grinning at him, both hands planted on her waist. 

Gene said to be confident and firm and people would overlook your age. Which was always a good thing since Harry wasn’t big enough to do much of anything _unless_ people overlooked his age. 

Just know what you want and go after it and you’ll get it, Gene said, but Harry had his doubts about that one. Gene was brilliant, except when he was silly, or maybe even then. Still…Harry had his doubts. Most people weren’t willing to forget he was five. 

He bit his lower lip briefly, sucked in a deep breath, tried a return smile. Okay. Firm. 

“Hi. I want a cheeseburger with fries. Everything on it. And a large root beer.” 

She whipped out a pen and paper from a previously hidden pocket and jotted that down. Everything was so _fast_. “Right away, sugar. And for your mom or dad?” 

“I’m here by myself.” 

Her brow furrowed even faster than she wrote, but the smile kept its place. 

“By yourself?” 

“Yes.”

“With no one else…”

Harry wiggled a little in his seat. “No. Just me.” 

“Little late to be out, don’t ya think, sweetie?” 

Harry shrugged, shifting uncomfortably. He could only hope that would be the end of the questions, though experience told him he’d have to go through at least two more rounds that got steadily more nosy. Gene said there was nothing worse than a “bleeding heart activist who wants everyone to think they give a damn.” Harry wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but he did know he preferred it when he was ignored. 

The grin didn’t fade once, but her eyes narrowed. “Your mom or dad know where you are?” 

“Do yours?” 

At this she paused, smile replaced with the tiniest of frowns. “How old are you, honey?” 

Harry was familiar with this line of questioning. Next would be, ‘What are you doing out here?’ and ‘Does anybody know?’ and ‘Are you lost?’ Then she’d tell him to stay where he was, she’d bring him something extra special, and before you knew it a skinny woman with too many teeth, or a balding plain man with a permanent scowl etched into his face, would be dragging him away. Then he’d never find Gene. 

“What is this,” Harry scowled, “a diner or the I.R.S.? Are you or are you not a fucking waitress?” 

Her grin returned rapidly like a light being switched on, then morphed again to something half amused, half irritated as a kid from the next booth over turned full around to yell at Harry. 

“Hey! Quit talking to my mother like that, you little shit.” 

The waitress smacked the kid in the back of his head lightly. “Watch your fucking mouth, Michael. This is an impressionable youth you’re talking to.” Turned back to Harry, she said, “Sweetie, I don’t think your mom would appreciate hearing that kind of language from you.”

His mum. His mum was dead, she didn’t give a damn what he said anymore. “Can I please get some bloody service, before I get too old to digest this cartery blocking shit?”

Now _worry_ and amusement. Normal people didn’t change emotions so fast, besides nothing here was funny. Gene would say, ‘Harry, be careful of someone who laughs for no reason. They’re not right in the head.’ 

“Right away your highness,” she said, bowed extravagantly. 

“The word’s artery,” the waitress-lady’s son said as soon as she was gone. He looked nothing like her, he was short and plump with tame brown hair. His face was screwed up in displeasure, not like her constant amusement. Which was worse? “Artery,” the boy repeated, “not cartery.” 

Just because he was bigger than Harry did not give him a right to use that superior tone. 

“Thank you Professor Git-head.” 

See? Nothing alike. The waitress-lady wouldn’t have stuck her tongue out at him and rolled her eyes. 

“Aww, Mikey,” a voice interrupted, “you finally found a friend your age. How cute. Did Deb set it up?”

There was the amusement, the boy’s face morphed just as rapidly as his mother’s had. Okay, they were related. 

“Fuck off, Brian,” the boy said to another who had slinked up beside them during their glaring contest. This new addition was taller than the first, skinnier, with a mouth that was more ‘perma-happy’—Gene’s word -- than the waitress-lady’s kid. 

“Now, now, Mikey,” the other boy said, “ what kind of language is that in front of the child? Keep it up and his mommy won’t let him visit ever again.” 

Harry scooted further into the booth until his back was pressed into the wall and did his best to ignore them both. 

Eventually the waitress-lady came back with his food and plopped it down in front of him. Eventually she even went away and let him actually eat it (Hey, Deb, my food while it’s still warm? Hold your fucking horses, a few degrees cooler isn’t gonna kill ya. Nothing to get your titties in a twist about. ) Not for long though. 

Throughout his meal they watched him, those three. No one else in the diner paid him any attention, but they made up for it. The tall kid stared at him openly, unflinchingly, with a gaze that made Harry fidget uncomfortably no matter how hard he tried to stop it. All throughout his meal. If he were a little less hungry he’d stuff the whole thing in his pockets and leave. The other boy and the waitress lady were quieter about it, for all their loud talk and fast expressions. 

The last bite was the hardest to take; curiosity, questions, and stares and still no Gene. Now he was out of money too. 

The waitress-lady appeared by his side instantly, cued apparently by Harry’s hands reaching for money in his jeans pocket. 

“You’re in luck, there’s a special tonight. One-hundredth customer gets their meal free. Enjoy, Angel. It’s you.” 

“So it was free?” 

The waitress-lady did her perma-happy look and nodded. “It was free.” 

Harry didn’t wait around for her to take it back.


End file.
